Rahane steers clear from Eden Gardens pitch controversy

Ajinkya Rahane, the Kolkata Knight Riders captain, stated that he doesn't want to offer any comments on the pitch at Eden Gardens publicly as it would lead to controversy. His statements came following his team's 4-run loss against Lucknow Super Giants on Tuesday.

The KKR skipper's statement was made on a day when 472 runs were scored across the 40 overs of play, with only 10 wickets falling. This came less than two weeks after Kolkata Knight Riders and Sujan Mukherjee, the pitch curator at Eden Gardens, had a standoff regarding who gets to dictate the terms of the pitch, with the latter requesting a spin-friendly surface to ensure home advantage.

In the previous game against Sunrisers Hyderabad, the franchise was given the option to choose between two pitches which were not watered for five days prior to their game. They went in with the drier of the two surfaces, and managed to bowl out their opposition, SRH, for only 120 runs to secure an 80-run victory.

In trying to evade giving his comments on what he thought of the surface for the game against LSG, Rahane also took a dig at the curator and said, "There have been enough talks over the wicket here. Main kuch bolunga to bawaal ho jayega (If I say anything, it'll lead to a big controversy).

"Let's just keep it that way. Our curator has got a lot of publicity. I think he's happy with that publicity. You can write whatever you want about the home advantage. If I feel something, I'll tell the IPL rather than talking here. I'll talk to the concerned authorities."

This was the defending champions' third loss in five games this season, with two of those coming at home. Their only home victory this season came on a slowish pitch against SRH.

While KKR's vice-captain Venkatesh Iyer and the head coach have suggested in the recent past that they wouldn't mind getting the home advantage, KKR's team mentor Dwayne Bravo indicated they were well prepared to tackle any surface, and he wasn't too concerned about the pitch on offer.

"For me, the team who plays the best on the day will win," Bravo had said ahead of the game against SRH. "So, whether the pitch is slow, whether it's turning, whether it's not turning, my advice to the players will always be to make the necessary assessments, and play according to the conditions."